Exiled: Keeper of the City

by Peter Morwood

  eventhorizonpg.com

  DAWN IN Niau was probably no different in its more basic aspects from the same time of day in any other city-state all across the world. A bit cold, a bit damp if it had managed to rain in the night, the brightening sky clear or dull as the weather dictated. This morning was pleasantly cool and fresh under a blue sky, the coolness and the freshness both legacies of a small, noisy, desert-born thunderstorm that had rattled shutters and shingles about the third hour. The quick, fierce downpouring of rain had left the air smelling sweet, clean, and for the moment dust-free, though that would change as the sun and the heat rose and the wind that always whispered in across the Eastern Desert carried the lightest motes of that desert in its wake. Its citizens—except for the fortunate few who had no need of such early rising—would stir from their pallets with pleasure or reluctance, yawn, stretch, eat something, and then be about whatever business concerned them. Except for those mrem employed by the secret police, because their business was concerned exclusively with that of other people....

  “Quiet night, sir.” If Reswen had heard that once since he entered Constables’ House, he had heard it twenty times. Not that he would have preferred more action. Far from it. That sort of attitude came in with new recruits and left them rather precipitately after their first eightday on duty. By the time they reached his side of the chiefs desk, those few that did, they had seen enough action in one form or another to keep them content with peace for the rest of their active lives.

  Reswen acknowledged the salutes of his two personal guards with a neat little flourish of his baton-of-office—a gesture unashamedly stolen from one of the players in a favorite dance-drama—and stalked up the curved flight of stairs that led to his office and his private duty-chamber. And to the file of observation reports which, regardless of whether the night had been quiet or busy, invariably spread themselves all across his desk.

  Today was no different. Reswen mewed softly, an inarticulate sound of pure disgust, as he closed the door behind himself and took first note of the piled-up documentation. Chief of Constables he might be, paid in gold where lesser mrem might see no more than silver, honored, respected, and invited to all the best parties. But the clandestine duty that accompanied the post, command of the secret police, always seemed to need not the brain that was renowned for its cunning, its wit, and its mordant humor all across Niau, but a plodding, methodical mind like that of the most menial file clerk.

  Reswen had been a file clerk once, long ago. He had been most things, since that morning outside the walls. He had indeed started on the walls, as a mere spear-carrier. At the time he had wondered what people back in Cragsclaw would think of it—the leader of small armies, now himself doing sentry-go, watch on and watch off, turn and about, and taking the same pay as any of the other guards. But what people back in his old haunts would have thought wasn’t the issue, doing his job well was. He paid no attention to the gibes of some of the younger guards, that someone his age should be dozing by the fire, or setting up in a shopkeeping job somewhere. It was a gibe, of course; he had barely five years on any of them. But those who chose to try to push the battered-looking mrem around a little, just for fun, shortly found out that fun was not part of what happened. Ears torn to rags were—for Reswen, unwilling to start an incident with one of these infants, batted them around like the half-wet kits they were and left them stunned, scarred, and mortified, but nothing worse.

  And word got around, as he had intended it to; mention was made to one superior by another, mention of this scarred guard-mrem with the patient temper and the quick eye. Someone suggested that he might be better employed than on the walls. Reswen had no idea who it was. On occasion it occurred to him to wonder whether the king might have had another friend or two in the city—friends who had no idea who he was.

  But it didn’t matter. The guards on the wall were part of the city police force of Niau, not part of the standing army (not that the army stood in any good order just then, a fact which caused Reswen some concern). Reswen was promoted (if that was the word) to file clerk, and secretary (having taken the time to learn a creditable shorthand), and then to beat policeman in one part of the city and another, and finally to posts within the constabulary itself, investigator and under-chief. And finally, after ten years or so, Chief Constable, when old Trrl died, and there was ostensibly no one better equipped to hold the job than he. Now, some twelve years into his tenure in Niau, Reswen’s was a name to conjure with in the town, not because of any battle ever fought back in the mists of time—for mrem on the borders of the world, Reswen sometimes observed to himself, have short memories—but for his own success at his job. He had won reasonable fortune, honor, and recognition from the worthy, the high, and the holy. To say nothing of a different mistress for every night of the eightday if he felt so inclined, a fine town house of his own—not a grace-and-favor house, either, but paid for out of his own pocket in ready money—and a noble’s title to wrap it all up in. He did not particularly like being reminded of past parchment-pushing chores each and every morning, and that he still derived a certain sour satisfaction from completing such a mediocre task as well as he was able struck him as one of the great ironies in a world filled with them.

  He sat down on the low chair, switching his tail into the recess left for it in the chair’s bentwood back, then smoothed the pleats of his military-cut kilt, laid jaw on paws, and considered the more or less orderly documents piled before him. Parchments, rag papers, wax-on-wood tablets; most of it would be useless or at very best only interesting gossip. From the rest he would collate the information gathered by his minions during the course of the preceding night: bits of usefully incriminating evidence against those whom either the Secret Police or the Council of Elders might at some stage need to exercise leverage; standard surveillance reports from the various consulates, embassies, and legations that Niau’s position invariably attracted; and, every once in a while, as a bribe or more simply as a juicy morsel uncovered in the course of some other investigation, something useful that would let him close a long outstanding case or (Reswen’s whiskers curved forward in a smile as he remembered the last time) even win some money by the placing of judicious wagers. But most often nothing especially dramatic. And that, most often, was the way he liked it.

  Reswen worked for two hours in relative silence, organizing the paperwork into separate heaps: one heap to be thrown away, another to be further checked before a decision, yet another for immediate attention. Once that was done he allowed himself time off for a snack of dried meat washed down with water, an austere little meal that made him feel quite virtuous. Chewing on another strip of the smoky, salty, tasty flesh, he strolled to the office window and gazed east toward the desert and the great silent threat beyond it. His tufted ears twitched involuntarily and flattened just a bit at the thought of one day looking out from this same window to see the wavering heat-haze darken and solidify into the invading armies of the Eastern Lords. If they came, when they came, they would come this way, following the caravan trail from oasis to oasis until they reached Niau and made the city the anvil to their hammer. But the oases, thank the gods, were few, and hard to find at the best of times, and also prone to failure. Not even the liskash would be very sanguine about trying that approach....

  Despite the glare from the sand that made everything dance as if reflected in a bowl of quicksilver, the narrow pupils of Reswen’s green eyes dilated very slightly in response to the picture that his mind had painted. He had an imagination, had Reswen, and unlike most military mrem who aspired to high rank, he had never been afraid to let that imagination color his thinking. That was why he wa
s so very good at his job. Reliance on the tried-and-true warriors’ skill was all very well in skirmishes and the traditional sorts of battle—it had certainly helped Talwe, all that while ago. But then that kind of approach had seemed to work better in those days and places; violence and luck granted either rapid success or rapid extinction. Reswen knew all about the judicious—and judicial—application of violence, but he was no longer sure he believed in any such thing as luck. And he doubted that such an approach would work against the Easterners. Home-grown warriors were all very well in highland skirmishes. But to fight armies a city needed soldiers—drilled, disciplined soldiers, backed up by efficient intelligence and the knowledge that their homes and families were protected by a force that rooted spies and saboteurs out of their city. A force like that which Reswen covertly commanded—the H’satei, the Quiet Ones.

  Reswen worried off another small piece of meat, and he continued to gaze out at the desert glare. His people were out there somewhere, two octs of the newest recruits, sent out two days ago for what they thought was just another of the exercises that their commander was so notoriously hot for. A survival exercise, they thought. Only Reswen and his senior staff knew—and had made certain that the exercising recruits didn’t—of the approaching caravan supposedly due into Niau today or tomorrow. If it got within sight of the city before a report of its presence got within sight of his desk, the recruits were going to find that their commander wasn’t just hot for exercises per se, but for the “vigilance constant and unfailing” written in shiny brass letters around the crest carved on the frontage of Constables’ House.

  So far there had been neither caravan nor breathless, draggle-furred reporter of its sighting, but Reswen remained unconcerned. Besides, he had other things to do than stand at the window watching the world bake. Today was payout day for the spies and informants working Northside, and if he didn’t get along and authorize their retainer chits, there was going to be a lot of anonymous but deeply felt dissatisfaction in the city.

  He swallowed down the last bit of meat, all its flavor chewed away by now, and turned from the window. Then turned back again with a snap as he saw—or thought he saw—something that hadn’t been there before. Nothing moved now, except for the horizon’s unending slow shimmer, but Reswen narrowed his eyelids until they were mere creases in the ginger-russet-fur of his face and stared at featureless brilliance until spots began to dance between his eyes and the world, and until the beginnings of a headache nagged between his brows. And until he saw again what he had seen before.

  The distant speck was still too far away for him to discern who it might be, but Reswen felt betting-certain that it was one of his recruits. “Good,” he said for no reason other than his own satisfaction. “Very good.” He gazed a moment more, then went downstairs to wait for what the courier had to say. And to deal with the wretched informers’ wretched chits.

  •

  “How much lead time do you expect, sir?” asked Sithen. Then he consulted his list and said, “Ten silvers to Reth One-Eye.”

  “Ten to Reth,” Reswen echoed, marking the chit and stamping it with his personal seal. “Too much for the little he provides. Either something useful next month or this is cut to five.” He put the parchment slip aside and yawned leisurely, all rough pink tongue and sharp white teeth, “You said ...? Oh yes. Time. I don’t know, but if it’s enough time for the city to get onto a defensive footing, then I’ll petition the Arpekh for a standing guard out there at all times.”

  Sithen’s whiskers twitched. “They won’t like it.”

  “Who? The Arpekh or the guard?”

  “Neither, probably. I wouldn’t like that posting myself, and as for our sage Council of Elders—”

  “—‘It’s too expensive, it’s not necessary, and we didn’t need such a thing in my sire’s time anyway.’” Reswen laughed softly, but the throaty purring trill that was mrem laughter sounded sour even to his own ears. “Yes. All their favorite arguments. But times change, and now it is necessary, and nothing so necessary is too expensive. Unlike these idlers.” He gestured at the stacked payment chits with an irritation made plain by the way his claws slid briefly from their sheaths. “Apologies, Sithen.” The claws retracted again. “My manners are slipping.”

  “Understandable, sir. Sometimes I feel like spitting myself.”

  Someone knocked outside the closed door. “Our messenger, I trust,” said Reswen. “Come in.”

  The guard who came through the door was armored in the cream-colored uxanhide of a duty constable, functional and unimpressive in the ordinary course of things, but looking positively magnificent by comparison with what he was escorting. The mrem by his side was even more scruffy and breathless than Reswen had imagined he would be, and the fair quantity of desert he carried about his person added to the general air of dishevelment.

  Reswen looked at him with mild surprise. “Mrem in the Constabulary are above average in their intelligence,” he said. “Usually that suggests enough native wit to avoid running through the desert after the sun’s well up.” He glanced at the guard. “Heth, bring this gallant idiot some water. And you, sit down before you fall down.”

  The scout collapsed gratefully onto a seat and Reswen had to pretend sudden interest in the expense chits to hide his smile. There was something amusing about the way this so serious, so intense young mrem—little more than a kitten, in truth—left small clouds of dust hanging in the air with every move he made, and Reswen knew perfectly well that smiling at the kit’s discomfiture wouldn’t make the youngster feel any better. He looked more closely, and pulled a name out of the cluttered files that comprised his mind right now. “Creel, isn’t it?” he said.

  “Yessir, Second-Oct Recruit Creel, sir!” The scout bounced upright again—another cloud of desert sifting from his person across Reswen’s desk—and saluted as briskly as his weariness allowed, from the set of his ears and whiskers very proud that this most senior of officers should remember his insignificant name. He wobbled as he stood.

  If Reswen had misremembered he had been ready to cover it with a joke about the concealing qualities of too much dust worn as a garment, and was as pleased as the youngster to have gotten the name right first time around. Remembering the names of each and every one of his constables was another matter—they were fully qualified, enlisted, and worthy of that sort of small consideration—whereas recruits ... Well, luck had a lot to do with it, if he really believed in luck, which he didn’t. But it did no harm. “Sit down, Creel, for pity’s sake. Don’t stand there weaving about like that. We’ll consider all respects and honors taken care of. Now, in your own words: What have you to report?”

  Second-Oct Recruit Creel blinked a bit at being treated so gently. Reswen’s reputation as a fire-eater was all over the recruit barracks, both verbally and as graffiti scratched at unlikely angles on the latrine and bathhouse walls, He was well known as a piss-and-sour-wine old bastard—the “old” again more a part of the disrespect than an accurate judgment of Reswen’s age. As usual, those newly adult considered those less newly so to be relics of an ancient age and ready for retirement. Yet Reswen’s reputation also said that his nature was even more full of ginger than his orange-tawny pelt suggested—but here he was, smiling right to the tips of his whiskers and being just as nice as a piece of fish. Probably, Reswen thought with mild satisfaction, Creel was quite confused,

  “Err ...,” said Creel, and swallowed. Then he coughed and drank more of the wonderful cool water that Old Ginger had summoned for them all to drink, because there was more dust than spit in his mouth and throat. “Sir, we, myself and the others, went on station and I suggested, I took the liberty of suggesting, sir, that if we were out in the desert we might as well look as if we belonged, so I, that is we—”

  “Creel, try this—because I think if we listen to your own words we’ll be here all day. Reply simply. What did the squad do?”

 
“Sir, we disguised ourselves as herders, sir.”

  “Herders?” Sithen glanced at Reswen and then at the recruit. “And what were you herding, pray tell? And how?”

  Reswen looked at his second-in-command and decided not to reprimand him for the interruption. At least not yet, not in front of young Creel. He made a mental note to hold the impoliteness in reserve for when it would be needed—as it would, sooner or later, when this mrem and his ambition overstepped the limits Reswen had already laid out for them—and instead nodded benevolently. “A very good point, Sithen. One I had considered myself.” And dismissed as not so very important right now, ran the unspoken rest of the sentence, clear enough for Sithen to read it whether spoken or not.

  “Sir, we were herding bunorshen, some of his father’s herd that Deiarth borrowed. He knows how to herd them, sir.”

  “Well done, Creel,” said Reswen and meant it, because the plan was a neat bit of protective coloration if anyone had to spend time out in the desert. The bunorshan’s fleece was valuable, but the animal itself was a damned nuisance, eating only the harsh pasture plants that grew in and along the edges of the desert, and grew so sparsely that the herds and herders were constantly on the move to the east of the city. “An excellent plan. And what did you—your squad, that is—discover? Foreigners, maybe? Invading enemies, perhaps?”

  “Sir!” Creel’s eyes had opened very wide, their pupils expanding enough to swallow up all but a thin green rim of iris. Evidently with this single observation, Reswen’s reputation for sagacity had increased by leaps and bounds. “Yessir! Not invaders, sir, but there’s a caravan approaching the city—and sir, there are Easterners traveling with them!”

  Reswen’s features betrayed nothing. “Which kind of Easterners, son? There are several....”

  “Oh, you don’t mean Iiskash, do you, sir? They’re extinct!”